Tora Kobayashi
Tora is a second-year student at U.A. High. A long range caster whose focus is on buff allies and de-buffing enemies. She's been the focus of much speculation that largely ends nowhere. She's best at crowd control and social interactions. Appearance Small and thin, Tora rarely leaves a very intimidating initial impression as she looks about as strong as the average toothpick. Despite this there's an aura of intimidating energy around her mainly from how intense she gets when she's utilizing her quirk. She is often described as pretty and she does have a traditionally attractive appearance if you're okay with gingers. Her hair is a bright red which makes her easy to see in the Japanese crowd and she's rather freckled this is a side effect of her family's quirk as she is completely Japanese for at least a few generations. She is actually rather insecure about her looks despite the fact that she knows she's traditionally pretty. This is likely because she looks exactly like her mother who is often described as looking absolutely amazing for her age. Due to an interesting mutation of her father's quirk when she feels intensely on any one emotion her eyes change color to reflect the state. The base color appears to be blue although, at least that is the most common color. Personality Snarky and distant to those she's not close to, Tora frequently seems to be rude or at least uncaring to outsiders. Due to the nature of her quirk she tries to refrain from overly expressive displays of emotion. Once past the outer most level of snark and protection one finds that she is actually not near as cold as she appears. She is fiercely protective of her closest friends and defensive of the innocent. She is generally fairly logical and intelligent in her actions choosing the sensible path in many cases, but not always. She maintains some level of childlike fantasy, such as believing in magic. This may be from her sheltered upbringing. Partially due to her quirk and partially due to her upbringing Tora has the ability to lie and manipulate with ease, she rarely uses the ability to the extent it can be used. She does frequently lie to her classmates and even her friends at times more often in a sarcastic nature for the intent of amusement and not maliciously. Synopsis Before UA Tora's childhood makes was one of loneliness and expectations so she is often likely to revert to that state without help from others. She was forced to be alone at times due to her lack of early control of her quirk and the fact that her parents (Kana and Junichi Kobayashi) She as the only child of politicians has a lot of pressure on her shoulders from her parents to be just like them. She was enrolled in UA to get advantage over others by being a hero who often get more votes in elections. She had extremely few friends growing up and even less positive adult influence often being left to her ever changing rotation of household staff. The only adult that really cared for her was her personal body guard (Konno Takauji) who would often take her out for ramen or other treats all the rest of the staff had a very high turnover rate. She was raised in a world of being ignored and forced to keep secrets which has left its mark on her and her abilities. Entering UA Tora was one of the original students at UA from day one. Having her first appearance as cold, distant, and surprisingly useful. On her first day at UA she used her quirk to calm a raging classmate Sam Burns stopping his then out of control quirk. Due to the election cycle being in full swing she frequently had to leave at times to pose and pander with her parents during her first few months at school, because of this she was gone for several major early villain attacks. Also due to her parents not wishing her to draw attention to herself so early during her time at UA she was forced to drop out of the Sports Festival at the final round claiming she felt it was undeserved for her to be there at that moment. Shortly after this she was approached by Lord, a former teacher, for information her parents could provide. The Tora vs Dōbi Fight All the suspicious activity at the time did not go without notice as several students had begun to see her as at the very least an outcast of sorts and potentially dangerous if not just weird. This was compounded by talk there was a traitor of sorts in the school. One student in particular Choko Dōbi took especially close notice into her activities and decided to research more into her. Unluckily for him due to her parent's political career searching her yields almost no results only information on them except for one article about an incident from her childhood. This led him to questioning her about it and her getting rather upset. The article is a source of embarrassment for her and him having it was upsetting but also unfortunately given her closed off nature she was not the type to explain why this was the case to him furthering suspicion. Now having come to a dead end but still having enough to hold over Tora's head Dōbi decided that the best way to settle their differences was a fight between them. After ultimatums and insults were exchanged the fight surprisingly ended in Tora's favor (this fight was scripted so there was no randomness with the result of the fight) this is because while the fight proved to Dōbi that she was not the one betraying UA's secrets while it only served to further incense her as she was firther lost in rage. It was when she had him held to the ground and beating on him that Henry Cross (Ghost) become aware of the situation and stopped the fight immediately leaving them both with an ingrain hatred and respect for each other as well as severe consequences for their actions. This led to a long standing rivalry of sorts. The Sam Coma Arc Despite being an outcast of sorts in the school Tora still had a few people she was close to, admittedly due to the closed off nature of her personality this is more because they flocked to her and not the other way around. One such person was Sam Burns who at the time had a romantic interest in her that she was unable to understand due to her emotional immaturity. Several months after the fight with Dōbi he slipped into a coma due to complications with his quirk. Tora was among the group that entered his mind to release him from the coma. This helped bridge the gap between her and Dōbi as well as brought her closer to Atsuro Nomer and Chiaki Robinson but ironically pulled her and Sam apart due to her having mourned his loss developing closer friendships with others. She was the first to die inside the mindscape giving her temporary brain damage affecting language (aphasia) but also didn't have to deal with the consequences of seeing her classmates die leaving her with the least amount of trauma. The Pied Pipers Tora also worked with Chiaki and Yuzu Hedoro during the license exam passing with the help of her team and officially receiving her hero name "Fantasy" and license making her qualified for an after school internship program. Rather then choose one of the school sponsored programs she sought out one that better fit her hero style and stumbled on "The Pied Pipers" an organization dedicated to the "non-violent" use of heroism. Due to the unique nature of her training by Ko Yamashita CEO of the Pied Pipers she was at her internship 3-4 days of the week after classes leading her to become distant from her classmates. What both her and the school was unaware of is the insidious nature of Yamashita's quirk and the slow effects it was having on her mental health and ideology. Interesting it actually was key in opening her up to being more emotive and forceful but also made her zealous of the organization's ideology. To some it seemed to be an improvement to most it was concerning, especially to Henry Cross (Ghost) who suspected Yamashita of the more insidious doings and tired warning Tora, which she brushed off and actually got angry at Cross for believing him of spreading misinformation. After a paperwork mistake caused by the media liaison of the Pied Pipers Tora accidentally received paperwork about a "quirk suppressing drug" that seemed to bind to the quirk receptor and cause the user to behave quirk-less for an unknown amount of time. It became clear to Tora that perhaps Cross was correct and there was more going on then meets the eye. She asked for help from some of her classmates (Atsuro Nomer, Chiaki Robinson, Joseph Warren, and Kemura Odayuu) to infiltrate the Piper HQ using some guest passes and retrieve the complete paperwork from Yamashita's safe. During their infiltration Tora was busy keeping Yamashita occupied where she discovered that he believes she is his biological child and that is why he has been keeping such close attention to her. After the students retrieve the necessary information and deliver it to Henry Cross (Ghost) Tora returns with them just to get a text from Yamashita and return to him immediately whether out of misplaced loyalty/trust or brainwashing it is unknown. Yamashita successfully altered some aspect of her mind which she is currently is feeling the effects of but before he could brain wash her into her evil future version (Darkest Future AU Tora) Cross arrives just in time to stop him and save her from further damage. Abilities Tora is a sly girl who does her best work from the edge of battle and in battles of wits more so than hand to hand. She is quick and agile as well as sneaky but she is most of all extremely convincing. Quirk Tora can manipulate anyone with in an acceptable range and cause them to feel as she feels. In the immediate range she can cause people to and have disadvantage on ability checks. It also allows her to redirect suspicion and cause people to sleep or be more active depending on the circumstances. She can also make people do as she desires in many cases not entirely but mostly against their will. Her quirk is extremely versatile in crowd management management but not exactly combat oriented she very much excels in the more conversation nature of things and is best left in the back of the back with protection when possible rather than at the forefront. Special Moves Fear Tora can clear a room rather easily by causing panic and unrest in the occupants causing those who she mentally overpowers to literally run from the scene. Calm Emotions When things get heated there has to be someone to cool the jets and as long as things aren't too heated Tora is there to turn a panicked crowd into a single file line. Great for public disasters or avoidable fights. RAGE When a fight is unavoidable pumping a teammate up is always a good call... even if they aren't the most mentally capable afterwards. Trivia *Tora has shown some extremely minimal talent at the magical arts but mostly keeps it up because she thinks it's funny when Elizabeth Tetsusei freaks out about it *Tora was not in the classes group chat for a very long time. She got an invite at some point and didn't accept it until the opportunity for a joke arose where she accepted, typed "F", and then proceeded to immediately leave before being invited again some months later by Toragi Kyuyu *Tora was called Hecate instead of Fantasy on her internship to fit the theme of the team she worked with most closely *She can fluently speak Japanese, English and Latin despite the last one being a dead language *She has freckles in the pattern of the Draco constellation on her hip *She owns a hairless cat named Harry Quotes * (To Choko Dōbi on the phone while having issues with aphasia) ”Shut!“ * (To herself while wishing on a star) "I shouldn't put so much pressure on one star, I might be asking too much." Category:Characters Category:Students